I believe if your life is a lemon, make it a lemonade. Then go out and find someone whose life is a vodka and have a party. -- Unknown

Tuesday, September 08, 2009

Not Allowing Comments on This One

***WARNINGS***

There will be some foul language. There will be politics. I’m not writing this to provide any sort of back and forth discourse. If you want a discussion or if you want to argue with me, go somewhere else. I really don’t care if you disagree with me. This post is for me.

I am a Christian. I grew up in a Southern Baptist town in a non-Southern Baptist church. That means that I was raised as a non-fundamentalist Christian. Go look it up. I am mostly conservative. My official political party affiliation is Republican, however, I identify more with our Libertarian friends than anyone else.

What this means is that I want the government to mostly stay the fuck out of my business. And your business. I don’t need the government to fix my problems or make decisions for me, for my own good. As a control-freak, I think I do a pretty damn fine job of taking care of myself and my family on my own. My decisions are my own. My choices are my own. And I own the consequences of my choices, both good and bad. I read a lot. I approach new things with an open mind. I utilize multiple resources on every side to educate myself.

Most of the government entities are bullshit. The Department of Education is a joke. Uncontrolled “czars” in Washington are a disgrace. Congress (both houses) needs to be fired and we need to start over from scratch.

I do not trust the same government who bloats and bankrupts every social program it gets its hands on to have any say in my health.

There’s a big brou-ha-ha going on because our current commander in chief is going to be speaking to our nation’s school children in a matter of minutes. I’ll be watching. Because it has been determined that this cannot be seen during non-work and non-school hours, I cannot watch it with my child. I have a problem with that. I think that if this speech is so important to our children, it needs to be important to me, and I have an issue with it being shown at a time where I have to take time away from my job, which as a responsible citizen, I have to help TAKE CARE OF my family. As an involved parent, I have a problem with being completely taken out of the equation.

I have an even bigger problem, though, with the Department of Education getting involved and providing “lesson plans” around his speech. This isn’t curriculum! And this won’t help a child score better on the SAT. The only good thing they did was revise their earlier plans of suggesting all school children write letters on how they would help President Obama. That was just plain wrong. And the fact that they thought it might be okay at all speaks volumes on what kind of government we now have.

Today’s speech is harmless, if it is exactly how it was posted on the White House’s website. All the people (like me) who have protested this will be pointed out as many things, but I can hear “right wing extremist nut-job” and “unreasonable” already. The thing is, based on experience, based on history, and based on who is doing the talking, I cannot trust what happens next. What is going to happen during the next speech to our children, after we’ve all been lulled into complacency?

This weekend, I allowed myself to be pulled into an argument about this very thing. I commented on a friend’s link on Facebook. I was respectful, clear, and reasonable in my objections. And I was attacked by her friends. It was insinuated that I was a bad parent. That I was afraid of having conversations with my child. That I was unreasonable. I was called out as being disrespectful to our president. And two things stood out during that ordeal… 1) The people who were attacking me and my views did so viciously and were so angered by the fact that I did not agree with them and their point of view, that they did not see the hypocrisy in their statements to me (if the roles were reversed, if GWB or John McCain were the ones doing the speaking, they would cry foul louder than I ever could… AND! For 8 years, the liberals in our nation did nothing but scream and pound their fists and disrespect GWB in the most vile of ways). And 2) I forgot that in order to be a “reasonable” individual to a liberal, you have to agree 100% with what they say and with their point of view. There is no discussion. There is no “agreeing to disagree.” And disagreeing with one means you are a horrible person.

One other thing stood out to me this past Sunday, too… I’m way too trusting and too gullible of an individual. I like to believe that people are generally good and have good motives. Therefore, if I think you are a good person and we have a good rapport, I will have your back no matter what. I will defend your right to speak your mind with all I have. I don’t have to agree with your point of view, and I might think you are over-doing it, but if you get attacked on your blog for speaking your mind, I will be there in the comments, defending your right to say it. Today, though, I’m a little less likely to do so.